


Lords of Chaos

by igrockspock



Category: Star Trek: Lower Decks (Cartoon), Star Trek: The Next Generation
Genre: Banter, Friendship, Gen, Hijinks & Shenanigans, Humor, Snark
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-21
Updated: 2020-12-21
Packaged: 2021-03-10 16:27:33
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,687
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28210137
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/igrockspock/pseuds/igrockspock
Summary: "I'm bored," Mariner says.  "Let's call Q."
Relationships: Beckett Mariner & Q, Brad Boimler & Beckett Mariner
Comments: 15
Kudos: 36
Collections: Yuletide 2020





	Lords of Chaos

**Author's Note:**

  * For [queenbookwench](https://archiveofourown.org/users/queenbookwench/gifts).



“I’m bored. Let’s call Q,” Mariner says from her bunk.

“You know how to call Q?” Boimler’s question comes out more like a shriek. A very manful shriek, of course.

“Well, yeah, duh.” She slides down to the floor, flipping a large gold coin into the air. “He says I’m very entertaining. Way better than Picard.”

Boimler chuckles nervously. “You know what’s fun? Alphabetizing the relays! Come on, we can do it now! Gamma shift always leaves the maintenance hatch open.”

“You can’t alphabetize relays, dorkus.”

“Everything can be alphabetized if you try hard enough.”

Tendi claps her hands. Whether she’s excited about Q or the alphabet is hard to say. Mariner shoots her a hard look, one that hopefully says _get excited about my plan or I’ll be mad at you._

“Do you think he’ll put us in the forest? With costumes?” Tendi squeals, shooting Boimler an apologetic look. “Sorry, I heard he did that to Picard, and I just really like cosplay.”

“Dunno, I’ll ask.” Mariner presses her thumb against the face of the coin. It’s just starting to heat up when Boimler yanks it out of her grasp. God, why had she ever insisted on giving him those martial arts lessons? It makes him a real pain in the ass.

“I hate the forest! I’m allergic to the forest!” He glowers at Mariner. “The last time we were in the forest, that giant spider tried to milk me. And more importantly, what if he puts humanity on trial again?”

Shit, now Tendi’s ringing her hands. “A trial? I’m not qualified for that! None of us are!”

“Duh, I’m sure it would be, like a vaccine trial or something.” Mariner says, even though she knows no such thing. Why would Q want them to test a vaccine? That would be boring as fuck, and if there’s one thing you can count on Q for, it’s high-quality chaos.

She kicks Boimler in the shin and snatches the coin while he’s off balance. “Q, I summon thee!” she shouts, thrusting the coin over her head.

Nothing happens. It’s not even hot anymore.

“Did you break my coin, asswipe?” She launches herself at Boimler, but the world is already fading to mist by the time her fists make contact.

Dimly, she hears him say, “Ouch! My kidneys are important!”

Tendi says, “Don’t worry, I can grow you new ones!”

“Fuck yeah! Organs are expendable!” Mariner shouts, but she’s not in the bunk room anymore. 

“You know, I’m on my third liver now,” says a bearded guy next to her. “I’m not sure Dr. Crusher appreciates my attitude though.”

Mariner blinks. She’s on the bridge of a starship. Not the _Cerritos._ This bridge is way too big and shiny for that. _Shit._ Man with a beard, right next to her. Everybody knows that beards are warning signs of an evil mirror universe. Except, oh god. _Dr. Crusher?_ Is this the _Enterprise_? That’s worse than an evil mirror universe. Way, way worse.

 _Stay calm, Beckett,_ she tells herself. Just a quick peek out of the corner of her eye… _Fuck._ There’s a twelve-year-old and a robot at the helm. This _is_ the _Enterprise._

“Captain? Are you alright?” Riker asks.

Captain? There’s no way he’s talking to her, right? Time slows down, like in the chase scene of some action holo. She reaches toward her collar and feels the four rank pips lined up there. Q made her the _captain_ of the _Enterprise._

She screams.

***

Okay, so being the captain of the flagship isn’t what she’d intended, but hey, at least she’d gotten a lionfish out of the deal. And a ready room with its own replicator, which is pretty badass.

The plaque on the wall says the lionfish’s name is Livingston. Fuck that.

“Computer, replicate me a sign that says Pointy McStabface,” she says. She sighs contentedly when it’s up on the wall. Her taste is so much better than Picard’s. 

And speaking of taste…

“Computer, open the keyword matrix,” she says. A little switcheroo here and there, and she can teach it to make cheese fries whenever someone asks for _tea, earl gray, hot._ Which is a stupid order anyway. Who drinks earl gray _cold_?

She’s just put the finishing touches on the new programming when Q winks in right behind her.

“Argh!” she shrieks, even though she should’ve been more prepared. Apparating right behind people is pretty on-brand for Q.

“Do you like my little game?” he purrs.

“Ugh, no, obviously not.” Mariner narrows her eyes. “I wanted to, like, wrestle a space squid for the fate of the galaxy.”

“I’m not your holodeck,” Q snaps.

“So do you not know how to make a space squid?” she asks. “Or do you just not know how to make the fate of the galaxy depend on it? And yuck, what are you wearing? You’re losing your touch!”

Q should really be dressed as Marine Antoinette or something. Instead he’s just wearing a Starfleet uniform, and he’s a lieutenant commander. _Gross._ That’s, like, middle management.

Q looks wounded for just a second before he goes back to looking haughty. He steeples his fingers together like some cartoon villain, which Mariner thinks is a little much, but then, _everything_ about him is a little much.

“Well then,” he says, “If you don’t like my game, I’ll just have to raise the stakes.”

“Uh, yeah, you’d better,” Mariner snaps, but he’s already disappeared, leaving her alone in Picard’s ready room with Pointy McStabface and a pile of cheese fries. She didn’t even get a chance to complain that doing this without her friends _sucks_ , because what’s the point of unleashing chaos if nobody’s around to admire it? 

Wait, no, rewind. _Q_ is here to appreciate her chaos, even if he’s being all sulky and invisible right now. Maybe chaos is exactly what he _wants_ her to do -- use her captain powers to fuck up Picard’s pretty, boring starship.

“Challenge accepted,” she says to the air.

***

She unleashes an army of overzealous nanytes on the ship’s plumbing system, so sickbay is overwhelmed with an unusual number of butt injuries. Sucks to be the nursing staff, because she’d locked Dr. Crusher in the cargo bay with Lieutenant Barclay and forbidden them to come out until he could tap dance. Somehow all of this results in Lieutenant Worf having to deliver a baby, which is an unforeseen but truly _excellent_ consequence.

Feeling encouraged, she moves onto phase two: teaching Wesley Crusher how to twerk. He’s _way_ better than she expected, so she decides to teach Data too. Honestly, that project is a little too successful, because she has to deprogram some social inhibition matrix in his positronic network, and then he won’t stop. It’s kind of disturbing, even for her, but whatev, it’ll be Jean-Luc’s problem soon.

That’s when the red alert klaxons sound.

She takes her time strolling from Ten Forward to the bridge, appreciating the zero-gravity bubbles strewn throughout the ship. Apparently that’s what happens if you try to plug in the relays in alphabetical order -- instead of, you know, the order they’re _designed_ to go in. 

“Computer, remind me to thank Boimler for the suggestion to alphabetize the relays,” she tells her padd.

The turbolift opens onto the bridge at last, and Riker gives her a peeved look. “Good to see you, Captain. We’ve been at red alert for seven minutes now.”

She shrugs and flops into the captain’s chair. “No worries. It’s probably just Moriarty. I set him loose on deck seven.”

“Excuse me?” says Counselor Troi.

Mariner turns toward her, contemplating. She’s thinking about separating the saucer from the drive section and putting Deanna in command of one, preferably alongside someone with a totally opposite personality. She’s just gotta figure out who…

“Captain,” says Data, fidgeting at his station.

Mariner holds up a hand, cutting him off. “Hang on a sec. Just gotta check on Dr. Crusher.”

She pipes in the feed from the cargo bay to the whole bridge.

“Tea for two, and two for tea,” Crusher sings. She holds out a patient hand toward Barclay. “Now let’s try a step ball change.”

Frankly, the woman looks like she’s having the time of her life, and Mariner mentally pats herself on the back. Nothing feels better than saving another person from a lifetime of senseless over achievement.

“Captain,” Data says more forcefully. “A Federation freighter is stranded in the Romulan neutral zone. We have intercepted a distress call from the crew, but we will be unable to assist them without entering disputed territory.”

Mariner shrugs. “Duh. Use the tractor beam?”

“As I have said, sir, the distance is prohibitive,” Data says, and Mariner decides she hates his stupid flat voice. What’s even the point of having an android if he can’t solve all your problems?

“Ugh, then beam them up or something,” she says, waving a vague hand toward Wesley’s station.

Wesley winces. “I can’t get a transporter lock, Captain. The ion radiation is interfering.” 

_Ugh._ When he’s not twerking, Wes is just a worse version of Boimler. She really misses him a lot right now, not that she’ll ever admit it.

“We’re being hailed, Captain,” Worf says. Evidently he’s finished delivering the baby.

Mariner slumps further into the captain’s seat. “Fine. On screen.”

“Captain, it appears that three humanoid lifeforms are being dangled over a magma pit, wearing only their undergarments,” Data reports uselessly. She has _eyes._

“I sense distress,” Counselor Troi adds.

“No fucking shit,” Mariner snaps back, and Deanna blinks.

“Yeah, we are definitely in distress over here.”

Mariner’s head snaps up at the familiar voice.

“Boimler! You’re here!” So much for pretending she didn’t miss him. She narrows her eyes at the screen. “Is Tendi with you?”

“We’re _on the screen_ ,” Boimler says. “Tendi and Rutherford are dangling over this magma pit just like me. What else are you even looking at?”

Mariner drags her eyes away from cargo bay tap dance feed, which she’d routed to her personal screen. Having your own video feed in the armrest is a perk of captaincy that she’d clearly underestimated.

“I thought there was going to be cosplay!” Tendi wails. She’s swinging back and forth over the magma pit in time with Boimler.

“Q gave you that nice metal bra,” Mariner points out. “I know, I know, sexy Orion stereotype. But look, Q’s not much for political correctness.”

“This is just my underwear,” Tendi says. She’s gnashing her teeth so loud that Mariner can actually hear it over the comm -- or maybe that’s just the magma hissing in the background.

“You wear a metal bra every day?” Rutherford exclaims, and Mariner wonders if he’s about to experience an awkward physical reaction. _Gross._ She’d probably go blind.

“It’s the traditional clothing of my people,” Tendi sniffs. “There’s no need to sexualize it.”

Boimler shrieks as the rope lowers him closer to the magma pit. “Can we stop debating underwear? My toe hairs are burning off!”

“That’s a favor to the whole galaxy,” Mariner points out, and Deanna Troi nods emphatically. Maybe she’s cool after all.

Just then, the rope drops all three of them closer to the magma pit. Boimler shrieks “my balls!” even though his junk is still _at least_ a good meter from the fire. 

Rutherford scans the magma with his cybernetic eye and pokes D’Vana. “You should see the field harmonics on this!” he says, but D’Vana is looking straight at Mariner with murder in her eyes.

“This is definitely your fault,” she says, and geez, Mariner hadn’t even known she could look that way.

“Hey, I’m really sorry I’m not up there with you guys,” she says, because she _is_. The whole point of this was to have crazy shenanigans _with_ her friends, not to be the authority figure who has to save their lives. “Mr. Data, rendezvous with the weird enemy lava ship and rescue these guys before they roast.”

“Captain, Romulan warbirds are waiting on the opposite side of the neutral zone,” Worf announces. “If we enter, they will attack.”

Mariner flings herself onto the floor of the bridge. “Goddammit, Q, the fucking _Kobayashi Maru_? You put me on the _Enterprise_ for a _command test_? You’ve lost your touch! I’m writing you a terrible review! Now bring back Picard and let him deal with this shit!”

Q, of course, does not appear.

Riker says, “Picard? That guy we busted down to ensign and left on the _Cerritos_?”

And then Wesley Crusher says the worst thing of all. “Captain, didn’t you beat the Kobayashi Maru?”

“You beat the Kobayashi Maru?” Boimler’s voice is, like, six octaves higher. Only dolphins can hear him -- or they could, if they weren’t extinct. Too bad aliens never came to rescue them, like humpback whales.

Mariner’s throwing up in her mouth a little now. _This_ has been Q’s game all along: force her to choose between her reputation and her friends’ lives. How can she possibly pick?

Laughter fills the bridge, and Q appears, dressed like Marie Antoinette. Probably because he was reading her thoughts. The guy has no boundaries whatsoever.

“Do you like our little game now?” he asks, rubbing his hands together. Just like that goddamned Ferengi Boimler had saved her from.

The rope drops them closer to the boiling lava. Tendi’s practically shooting laser beams from her eyes, Rutherford’s so enraptured by the field harmonics he doesn’t even realize how close they are to death, and Boimler’s toe hairs are actually burning.

“Fine, okay, I’ll reveal that I’m a scientific genius and a command genius,” Mariner says, slumping down in the captain’s chair. Five years of carefully cultivating her reputation as an idiot slacker, gone in an instant. “Mr. Crusher, scan for asteroids nearby continuing pyridium, and use it to amplify the wavelength of the tractor beam.”

Beckett buries her face in her hands as Wes technobabbles about what a genius she is, using obscure properties of pyridium could to scatter ionizing radiation. Boimler and Riker both stare at her with wonder. Even Deanna looks approving.

And now her shame is laid bare for everyone to see: the solution so ingenious and obscure even the Starfleet Academy computer hadn’t seen it in time to stop her. The thing that had solidified her rank at the top of her class and nearly locked her into a lifetime of overachievement. She's a _nerd._

And now everyone knows.

Her reputation is _ruined._

***

The bridge of the _Enterprise_ fades to mist, and Beckett awakens on an inflatable flamingo floating serenely through an enormous swimming pool. A Cardassian sunrise bobs along beside her, miraculously never sinking or spilling.

“What the fuck did you do all that for?” Beckett asks.

Q drifts toward her, astride a gigantic floating unicorn. “You ignored me the last time I came to the _Cerritos_ , mon ami.”

“So you had to get revenge?” Beckett asks, although there's not much venom in her words. The Cardassian sunrise is really taking the edge off. She sighs. “Has anyone ever told you you’re a really high maintenance friend?”

“I’m your friend?” Q beams.

“Ugh, fine, yes.” Beckett glances down at her swimsuit, which is an annoyingly tame shade of pink. “I’d like you better if you gave me a metal bra though.” She shoots him a glare. “Better than Tendi’s, I mean.”

Q waves a hand. “Consider it done.”

Beckett stares down at her new chainmail bikini, feeling satisfied for the first time in the day. If she got good underwear out of the deal, it was hard to complain. “Hey, can I use this to summon you?” she asks, tapping on one of the metal cups.

Q nods, and Beckett releases a contented sigh. No way Boimler would ever touch _this._ Now she can summon Q anytime she wants. Next time there will definitely be a space squid. And so what if her friends know she's a command genius _and_ a scientific genius? The important thing is that she never has to _act_ like one.

Unless her friends’ lives are on the line. Then it will be worth it.


End file.
